At the very last minute, Representative Steve Stockman filed today to run challenge Republican senator John Cornyn of Texas in the 2014 elections.

Stockman, a darling of the grassroots with a penchant for controversial Twitter statements and headline-grabbing comments, is a very, very long shot. But hes by far the most prominent threat to the senator, who has a number of other less well-known challengers. World Net Daily reported at about 7:30 p.m. today that the congressman would challenge Cornyn. The site says Stockman said he decided to run because he believes Cornyn undermined Sen. Ted Cruzs fight to stop Obamacare. More from that article:

WND asked: What makes you think you can beat this entrenched incumbent?

I dont know that I can beat him, but I am sure going to try, he said, adding that he thinks he has a shot because, In Texas, conservative policies win over stabbing fellow Republicans in the back.

Stockman will try to ride the wave of voter discontent with Obamacare.

In October, he was already predicting a silver lining to the failed attempt to defund the health-care law, telling WND, In every loss, there can be a victory.

Because Stockman filed so late, there arent any especially prominent East Texas Republicans running to fill his congressional seat, in southeast Texass 36th congressional district. As of 3:56 p.m., only Phil Fitzgerald, a former judge, and John Amdur (the address listed is a Houston P.O. box) have also filed to run for his seat. The surprising move has irked many Texas Republican insiders: One Austin consultant tells National Review Online that he believes Stockman went out of his way to keep his intentions secret from James White, a state representative from the district who probably would have run to fill the seat if he had known about Stockmans statewide ambitions.

White may just wait for 2016: No doubt about it, James White will run next year, the consultant says.

Its a disappointment, he adds, noting that a victorious White would be the only African-American Republican in the House (Tim Scott was appointed to the Senate in 2013 and Allen West lost his reelection in 2012).

UPDATE: Not everyone is disappointed. Matt Hoskins, the executive director of the Senate Conservatives Fund, tells National Review Online that his group is mulling an endorsement.

We havent decided yet whether we will endorse Steve Stockman, but were excited about the potential here, he e-mails. Texas deserves two conservative fighters in the Senate, not just one. John Cornyn has voted to increase the debt, raise taxes, bail out Wall Street banks, and fund Obamacare. Hes part of the problem in Washington and voters deserve an alternative.

Meanwhile, Cornyns office released a statement this evening touting his endorsement from Texas Right to Life.

Senator Cornyn looks forward to discussing his conservative record with Texans, said campaign manager Brendan Steinhauser in the statement.

"If we must have an enemy at the head of Government, let it be one whom we can oppose, and for whom we are not responsible, who will not involve our party in the disgrace of his foolish and bad measures." - Alexander Hamilton

"We don't intend to turn the Republican Party over to the traitors in the battle just ended. We will have no more of those candidates who are pledged to the same goals as our opposition and who seek our support. Turning the Party over to the so-called moderates wouldnt make any sense at all." -- President Ronald Reagan

"A thing moderately good is not so good as it ought to be. Moderation in temper is always a virtue; but moderation in principle is always a vice." - Thomas Paine 1792

"It does not take a majority to prevail, but rather an irate, tireless minority, keen on setting brushfires of freedom in the minds of men." - Samuel Adams

"If ye love wealth better than liberty, the tranquility of servitude better than the animating contest of freedom, go home from us in peace. We ask not your counsels or your arms. Crouch down and lick the hands which feed you. May your chains set lightly upon you, and may posterity forget that you were our countrymen." - Samuel Adams

Is this the new rep. that Stockman’s decision has set in place? If so, it may ruin Stockman.

BEAUMONT, Texas - A former Liberty County Judge and Commissioner, and a local businessman have all been indicted in a hurricane fraud scheme in the Eastern District of Texas announced U.S. Attorney John M. Bales
John “Phil” Fitzgerald, 51, of Liberty, Texas, Herman “Lee” Groce, 62, of Cleveland, Texas, and Mark Wayne Miksch, 52, of LaVernia, Texas, were named in a 25-count indictment returned by a federal grand jury on Jan. 26, 2011. The defendants have been summoned and will make their initial appearances on Feb. 1, 2011 before U.S. Magistrate Judge Earl S. Hines

8
posted on 12/09/2013 8:36:23 PM PST
by Theodore R.
(The grand pooh-bahs are flirting with Christie, but it's Jebbie's turn!" to LOSE!)

” - - - Stockman said he decided to run because he believes Cornyn undermined Sen. Ted Cruzs fight to stop Obamacare. More from that article:

WND asked: What makes you think you can beat this entrenched incumbent?

I dont know that I can beat him, but I am sure going to try, he said, adding that he thinks he has a shot because, In Texas, conservative policies win over stabbing fellow Republicans in the back. - - - - “

I was looking at Stockmans resume. Whatever he is, he is no Cruz, and it would take someone like Cruz to knock Cornyn out of the Senate. The best that can be hoped for is to push Cornyn further to the right at least for the next year.

Stockman’s primary opponent in the last election, Stephen Takach, is a very good conservative Christian. Should Takach run again, he will easily beat any Democrat in the District.

Stockman is my Congressman, and I would have been very satisfied with Takach. Stockman was very aggressive in his campaign and it was Takach’s first political contest.
Substantively, there was little difference between the two.

Steve Stockman is for real. I haven't followed his political career as closely as I probably should have but still in all, I don't recall ever hearing a discouraging word about him...from anyone that matters. He is my congresscritter; for the second time. The first being some years ago before the union thugs in Jefferson County(where I lived at the time) "fixed" their machines to more accurately reflect the views of the union label. Many things have happened since then; not the least of which was redrawing congressional districts. For now at least, Jefferson County's voting machine shenanigans aren't enough to foil the larger conservative demographic drawn into that district. Which BTW, no longer includes Stockman's district. Breaks my heart, truly... ;^)

36
posted on 12/09/2013 10:51:52 PM PST
by ForGod'sSake
(What part of "Fundamentally transforming the United States of America" don't the LIV understand?)

“Because Stockman filed so late, there arent any especially prominent East Texas Republicans running to fill his congressional seat, in southeast Texass 36th congressional district. As of 3:56 p.m., only Phil Fitzgerald, a former judge, and John Amdur (the address listed is a Houston P.O. box) have also filed to run for his seat. The surprising move has irked many Texas Republican insiders: One Austin consultant tells National Review Online that he believes Stockman went out of his way to keep his intentions secret from James White, a state representative from the district who probably would have run to fill the seat if he had known about Stockmans statewide ambitions.

White may just wait for 2016: No doubt about it, James White will run next year, the consultant says.

Its a disappointment, he adds, noting that a victorious White would be the only African-American Republican in the House (Tim Scott was appointed to the Senate in 2013 and Allen West lost his reelection in 2012).”

Sounds like Stockman is like school on Saturday: no class. Keeping his decision not to run reelection secret so that those who ran against him in the 2012 primary and other area Republicans missed the filing deadline, leaving only some unknown guy and a county judge indicted for fraud as the only two Republicans on the ballot? Stockman is one of the rare non-Paulbot who is strongly supported by the Paulistinians—I guess that he’s a fellow traveler of the cult—and this sounds like a Paulistinian tactic to make a Paulbot the default GOP nominee (like what happened with Bentivolio in MI-11 last year).

BTW, while I can understand that Stockman prefered to keep his Senate ambitions secret until the last minute, he could have announced a week ago that he was forgoing reelection so as to allow interested Republicans to file and thus give Republican voters a choice.

So what will happen now? If the filing deadline is final and filing can’t be reopened, I expect that there will be several write-in candidacies. Hopefully the method for writing in a candidate in the primary is less burdensome than it was in TX-22 in 2006 when Tom DeLay dropped out and the GOP was not allowed to replace him in the general-election ballot, so Republicans who wanted to stop RAT Nick Lampson (ironically, the man who defeated Steve Stockman in his 1996 reelection effort) from winning by default had to write in “Shelley Sekula-Gibbs” by spelling out her name on some sort of wheel contraption, and she fell far short.

With several write-in candidates, there likely will be a run-off for the GOP nomination (the indicted judge and the unknown guy would be unlikely to get the 50%+1 needed to win the primary outright), and the top-two finishers would have their names on the ballot for the run-off. Hopefully at least one of the write-ins makes the run-off and Republicans in the district get a real choice.

So, will Representative James White run as a write-in? The consultant’s statement that “no doubt he will run next year” was interpreted by the author of the article to mean that White would wait until 2016 and challenge whoever wins this time, but that diesn’t make sense, since “next year” isn’t 2016, it’s 2014. I think that James White will run as a write-in, with his easy-to-spell name being a plus (or at least not a liability). Others will run as well, and White will have to finish in the top two in the first round and then win the run-off. Tough but doable; so there’s still a chance that there will be a black conservative Republican representing SE Texas in Congress.

There is no “write-in” permitted in a primary in TX. Write-ins must declare themselves within 45 days of a general election and run as essentially a third-party candidate. Looks like Stockman has once again ruined his own promising career. TX wouldn’t dare reject Cornball.

42
posted on 12/10/2013 4:43:34 AM PST
by Theodore R.
(The grand pooh-bahs are flirting with Christie, but it's Jebbie's turn!" to LOSE!)

“There is no write-in permitted in a primary in TX. Write-ins must declare themselves within 45 days of a general election and run as essentially a third-party candidate.”

That really sucks; but now that you mention it, I do recall hearing something about write-ins not counting after the ultra-tight Henry Cuellar-Ciro Rodriguez TX-28 primary in 2004 (when had there been like 60 write-ins cast and counted it would have denied Cuellar a majority and resulted in a run-off), but I thought that they were talking about write-ins for undeclared candidates.

Looked it up, and the write-in prohibition in primaries is from a 1986 law, amended in 1997. Maybe the TX legislature could amend the law and permit write-ins in federal primaries.

So, unless there’s a change in law, Stockman has really screwed conservatives by his last-minute decision; maybe he’s more than just a “fellow traveler” of the Paulistinians. That judge accused of fraud (Phil Fitzgerald) was not the only Republican to file yesterday right before the gun; TheGreenPapers.com also lists Doug Centilli, Chuck Meyer, Kim Morrell and Dave Norman as filing yesterday:

The question is, which one is the Paultard? Because I’m certain that Stockman whispered his intentions to his Paulistinian friends so that they could run a Paul cultist and steal a House seat that they could never win fairly. I think that, sadly, we’ll know which one is the Paulbot when one of them proclaims himself to be the “TEA Party choice” despite having no record of anything, and a bunch of FReepers are fooled into thinking that only so-and-so is a real conservative.

So I think that there’s a good chance that we’ll be stuck with a Paultard congressman for two years, and either James White or some other proven conservative can take out the trash in 2016, similar to what happened in MI-11 with Kerry Bentivolio.

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